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With right-wing opposition to the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) becoming increasingly unhinged, it was no surprise that Family Research Council president Tony Perkins warned members in an email today that ENDA would destroy businesses, entire communities, and the First Amendment.

Perkins writes that ENDA, which would add sexual orientation and gender identity to current non-discrimination protections such as race, religion, gender and disability, would “banish” Christians from society and have them “stripped of their livelihood” while turning America into Nazi Germany.

They're pushing ENDA again -- the Employment Non-Discrimination Act -- which would strip Americans of their religious liberties. No longer will an employer be able to make employment decisions based on what qualities or characteristics are most relevant to a particular job. Instead, ENDA will grant special rights and privileges, special power over an employer's religious convictions, to an entire group of people -- simply because of their preference for a certain type of sexual activity.

This is the most perverse distortion of the Constitution of the United States imaginable. And is more likely to impact you personally than ever before. Because ENDA is the federal government forcing a pro-homosexual point of view upon the entire (supposedly "free") marketplace.

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You enjoy working in a Christian-owned business, for example. It's a great place to work, a good family-friendly environment. If your company does any work with the federal government, or if you're a subcontractor to a business holding a federal contract, you could suddenly find that your company's policies, if they reflect biblical views and values, are considered a violation -- and the company could lose that contract. Company revenues plummet. People get laid off. Maybe the company has to close its doors altogether and you are out of work.

As businesses are boarded up, whole communities will be affected. But the powerful anti-Christian lobby will dust off their hands: mission accomplished.

ENDA takes the chilling concept of "Big Brother" one diabolical step further . . . to "Big Bully." The federal government becomes the "enforcer" for liberal activists, driving anyone with a traditional view of natural marriage into the shadows ... because of the threat of a federal lawsuit.

You no longer enjoy freedom of speech, freedom of religion, or freedom of association. The First Amendment is dead to you -- because of your biblical views on the sin of homosexuality.

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If the federal government can coerce you to comply with its views . . . cooperate with its policies . . . contribute to its plans for the transformation of America . . .

. . . well, sadly, this looks more and more like totalitarianism. We only have to look back to 1930 in Germany, or the USSR in the 1950s, to see what happens when leaders impose a totalitarian state on the people.

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They are pushing for America to conform to their ideology. Freedom of speech and religion have no place in their vision. We can't let it happen.

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. . . then anyone in America can be targeted ... called out ... pilloried in the public square . . . stripped of their livelihood ... branded as a "bigot" and banished from "society."

It was largely off their radar, that is, until this week. This morning, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on a proposal by Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., to send a constitutional amendment to the states restoring to Congress and state governments the ability to regulate the raising and spending of money in elections. In response, Republican politicians and conservative activists have kicked into gear and are starting to try out new talking points to get their movement to oppose efforts to lessen the influence of big money in politics.

Burchfield and McGahn both argued that the introduction of the constitutional amendment means, in the words of McGahn, that campaign finance law advocates are “admitting” that campaign finance regulations are “unconstitutional.”

On the surface, this is the opposition’s strongest argument, because it sounds so scary. But it’s just not true. Whether you support the Udall amendment or not, it’s dishonest to suggest that it would amount to a “repeal of the First Amendment.” Instead, proponents argue that it strengthens the First Amendment by undoing the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence declaring that spending on elections, including from corporate treasuries, cannot be limited. Proponents of the Udall amendment hold that this jurisprudence, including recent decisions in the Citizens United and McCutcheon cases, represented a radical reinterpretation of the First Amendment; undoing them would simply re-establish the ability of Congress and the states to set reasonable regulations on the raising and spending of money to influence elections.

The Heritage panelists repeatedly claimed that the Udall amendment is an attempt to protect incumbency by preventing challengers from raising enough money to win elections. McGahn insisted that it was an effort by Democratic incumbents “desperately clinging to power.”

“They want to change the rules of the game and prevent people from criticizing them, not unlike England did before our revolution, and which led to our revolution,” he added.

The American Family Association’s Sandy Rios also invoked the American Revolution in an interview with von Spakovsky yesterday, saying, “The First Amendment, the rights to free speech – particularly the right to political speech – were the right to criticize the king, criticize the authorities over you.”

In a later interview with Rios, Tea Party Patriots spokesman Scott Hogenson even managed to connect the Udall amendment with immigration reform, claiming that both are part of a “larger, concerted effort to maintain the Democratic Party’s control of American politics and eventually move to one-party rule.”

In reality, it’s unlimited campaign spending that tends to be a boon for incumbents, who on average are able to raise far more than challengers. For instance, in Texas, a state with few campaign finance limits, incumbents who win on average raise more than twelve times the average amount raised by challengers. By contrast, in Colorado, which has relatively low individual contribution limits, incumbents on average raise less than three times what challengers are able to raise [pdf].

Von Spakovsky also played up conservative conspiracy theories about the “liberal media,” telling Rios, “No surprise, there’s a glaring exception in this proposed amendment for the press. And that means that MSNBC or the New York Times Company, which are big corporations, they could spend as much newsprint or airtime as they wanted going after and criticizing candidates or talking about political issues.”

These arguments fail to recognize one key distinction, which is that there is a difference between the New York Times publishing an editorial (which would be protected under the proposed amendment, as it is now) and the corporate managers of the New York Times taking $50 million out of their corporate treasury to buy ads to influence an election (which would not be protected).

It’s no coincidence that Cruz rolled out his criticism of the Udall proposal at a pastors’ event organized by the Family Research Council, a main theme of which was the supposed assault on the religious liberty of Christians in America. Cruz told the pastors that the Udall measure would “muzzle” clergy and was being proposed because “they don’t like it when pastors in their community stand up and speak the truth.”

Likewise, McGahn said at the Heritage event that the amendment would endanger the religious liberty of clergy: “What about pastors and churches? This is an issue that comes up once in a while. Can the government get in there and tell a priest he can’t talk to his congregation because it may somehow have something to do with politics?”

This might be true if the proposal would, in fact, “repeal the First Amendment.” In fact, the First Amendment’s protection of religious liberty would remain in place.

Along with comparisons to British control before the American Revolution, amendment opponents are trying to link the Udall proposal to the 18th century Alien & Sedition Acts.

In his interview with Rios yesterday, van Spakovsky claimed that “the last time Congress tried to do something like this was when they passed the Alien & Sedition Act in 1798 that criminalized criticism of the government.” Multiple GOP senators at today’s hearing, including Judiciary Committeee Ranking Member Chuck Grassley, repeated the talking point.

Of course, the amendment does nothing to reduce the right of individuals to criticize the government or politicians.

6. The polls are skewed!

When an audience member at yesterday’s Heritage Foundation panel asked about polls showing overwhelming opposition to the Citizens United decision, McGahn replied that the questions in the polls were “skewed.”

You can judge for yourself whether this question from a recent Greenberg Quinlan Rosner poll – which found 80 percent opposition to the Citizens United decision – is “skewed” on behalf of campaign finance law proponents:

In one of the least self-aware moments we’ve witnessed in the last few days, McGahn told the Heritage audience that campaign finance reform proponents could have just worked for tougher disclosure requirements, which the Supreme Court’s majority has consistently endorsed as a way to prevent corruption:

What’s interesting is the courts have upheld some disclosure of independent speech, which six months ago was supposed to be the answer, a year ago was supposed to be the answer – remember the DISCLOSE Act, Part 1 and Part 2? Well, that was supposed to cure all the ills in our democracy, but unfortunately I guess they’ve given up on that and they’ve moved to the more radical change, which is the constitutional amendment.

Speaking to the Heritage audience, Burchfield presented the curious argument that the Udall amendment would demand to "equalize debate among the haves and have-nots,” and since “the portion is small” of “those with limited means” who participate in electoral debates, this would require “severe restrictions.”

The rich do not advocate a single viewpoint. Think of Sheldon Adelson and George Soros, they don’t agree on anything. There are strong voices on the left and on the right, not just in privately funded campaign advertisements, but also in the broadcast and print media. Only a small portion of those with significant resources even bother to participate in the debate. And among those with limited means, the portion is small indeed. In order to equalize debate among the haves and the have-nots, severe restrictions would be necessary. The quantity and quality of discourse would certainly suffer.

The amendment under consideration doesn’t require that everybody be heard an equal amount; instead, it gives Congress and the states the ability to create a more even platform for those who wish to be heard, regardless of their financial means.

Hogenson told Rios that the Udall amendment is “just taken right out of Saul Alinksy’s book, ‘Rules for Radicals,’ it just makes up a gigantic lie and perpetuates it, that somehow democracy needs to be restored.”

Von Spakovsky also invoked Alinsky in his interview with Rios, claiming that criticism of the enormous political spending of the Koch brothers is an Alinskyite plot: “What’s really going on here is, look, if you look at Alinsky’s ‘Rules for Radicals,’ one of the rules that he sets out is you pick a villain and you basically blame those villains for all of the problems. It’s a way of distracting the public, it’s a way of diverting attention, and that’s exactly what Harry Reid and the Democrats are doing here.”

Newsmax host and former Republican congressman J.D. Hayworth added his voice today to the growing right-wing outrage over the release of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl in a prisoner exchange with the Taliban, and what better person to discuss the situation with than Oliver North!

North demanded that the media ask the Obama administration if there was “a ransom, a fiscal, financial, money transaction,” with the Taliban as part of the deal. “Was there a ransom paid? Did the government of the United States, either directly or indirectly, finance a terrorist organization?”

North, of course, was heavily involved in the Iran-Contra scandal, in which Reagan administration officials unlawfully sold arms to Iran in hopes of releasing American hostages and used the proceeds of the sale to illegally fund Contra militants in Nicaragua, and then attempted to cover up their work.

The Iran/contra affair concerned two secret Reagan Administration policies whose operations were coordinated by National Security Council staff. The Iran operation involved efforts in 1985 and 1986 to obtain the release of Americans held hostage in the Middle East through the sale of U.S. weapons to Iran, despite an embargo on such sales. The contra operations from 1984 through most of 1986 involved the secret governmental support of contra military and paramilitary activities in Nicaragua, despite congressional prohibition of this support.

The Iran and contra operations were merged when funds generated from the sale of weapons to Iran were diverted to support the contra effort in Nicaragua. Although this ``diversion'' may be the most dramatic aspect of Iran/contra, it is important to emphasize that both the Iran and contra operations, separately, violated United States policy and law.2 The ignorance of the ``diversion'' asserted by President Reagan and his Cabinet officers on the National Security Council in no way absolves them of responsibility for the underlying Iran and contra operations.

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The operational conspiracy was the basis for Count One of the 23-count indictment returned by the Grand Jury March 16, 1988, against Poindexter, North, Secord, and Hakim. It charged the four with conspiracy to defraud the United States by deceitfully:

(1) supporting military operations in Nicaragua in defiance of congressional controls;

(2) using the Iran arms sales to raise funds to be spent at the direction of North, rather than the U.S. Government; and

(3) endangering the Administration's hostage-release effort by overcharging Iran for the arms to generate unauthorized profits to fund the contras and for other purposes.

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The illegal activities of the private citizens involved with the North and Secord operations are discussed in detail in Part V. The off-the-books conduct of the two highly secret operations circumvented normal Administration accountability and congressional oversight associated with covert ventures and presented fertile ground for financial wrongdoing. There were several funding sources for the contras' weapons purchases from the covert-action Enterprise formed by North, Secord and Hakim:

(1) donations from foreign countries;

(2) contributions from wealthy Americans sympathetic to President Reagan's contra support policies; and

(3) the diversion of proceeds from the sale of arms to Iran.

Ultimately, all of these funds fell under the control of North, and through him, Secord and Hakim.

North used political fundraisers Carl R. Channell and Richard R. Miller to raise millions of dollars from wealthy Americans, illegally using a tax-exempt organization to do so. These funds, along with the private contributions, were run through a network of corporations and Swiss bank accounts put at North's disposal by Secord and Hakim, through which transactions were concealed and laundered. In late 1985 through 1986 the Enterprise became centrally involved in the arms sales to Iran. As a result of both the Iran and contra operations, more than $47 million flowed through Enterprise accounts.

Rick Wiles, the End Times radio host who thinks the Sandy Hook and Columbine shootings were carried out by CIA “mind-control assassins” and that Adolf Hitler’s "race of super gay male soldiers” is taking over America, is angry at Pat Robertson for saying “crazy things” and becoming an “embarrassment” to the conservative movement.

On his TruNews program on Friday, Wiles lamented that he used to look up to Robertson, but “in recent years, Dr. Robertson has been saying some really crazy things” about Creationism and is “becoming an embarrassment to those of us who are upholding the ancient faith handed down in the Book of Genesis.”

Wiles was joined by the Creation Museum’s Terry Mortenson, who explained that modern geology and the big bang theory were developed by “godless men or professing Christians who didn’t pay attention to what the Bible said.”

He added that scientists who fail to take the Bible literally are"really, really irresponsible" and like police detectives who ignore eyewitness testimony, because “God’s eyewitness testimony in the scripture is the key evidence for unravelling the rocks of the earth.”

Wiles spent the first half of his program presenting the totally reasonable theories that the Bilderberg Group is controlling U.S. presidential elections and that the Federal Reserve is going to start cutting off the bank accounts of same-sex marriage opponents.

In just a few minutes of Rick Wiles’ TruNews program on Friday, we learned that Hillary Clinton “covered up Vince Foster’s murder” and was chosen by the “Bilderberg boys” to be president; that the federal government is collecting bank account information in preparation to “steal” and “redistribute” wealth; that the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation is planning to cut off the bank accounts of same-sex marriage opponents and global warming deniers; and that something mysterious is up with the appointment of U.S.-Israeli dual citizen Stanley Fischer to be the vice-chairman of the Federal Reserve.

Wiles started off the program by speculating that Clinton and “Barack ‘Benghazi’ Obama” met last week “to get their story straight” about the 2012 Benghazi attack. “But that’s no big deal for Hillary,” Wiles said. “I’m sure she told Obama how she covered up Vince Foster’s murder.” He also invoked the conspiracy theory that the Netherlands-based Bilderberg Group, which is meeting this year in Copenhagen, is secretly controlling world affairs and has “chosen” Clinton to be the next president.

Hillary Clinton and Barack ‘Benghazi’ Obama held a secret meeting yesterday. Most likely, they need to get their story straight about what happened on the night of September 11, 2012, when Obama and Clinton let four Americans die at the hands of Islamic murderers. But that’s no big deal for Hillary. I’m sure she told Obama how she covered up Vince Foster’s murder. Or Hillary informed Obama that the Bilderberg boys called from Copenhagen and told her she’s been chosen to be president in 2016.

The U.S. federal government is building a massive database with personal financial information on every American citizen, all of your mortgage information, loans and credit card payments, account balances, credit history, late payments, minimum payments, account balances, racial and ethnic data, gender, marital status, religion, education, employment history, military status, the number of people in your home, your wealth, your assets, will be stored for Washington’s snoopy eyes. You see, the communists must first identify who has the wealth before they can steal it and redistribute it.

Later, during an interview with Gun Owners of America president Larry Pratt, Wiles wondered how “the governor of the Bank of Israel move over to the United States and become the deputy chairman of the Federal Reserve, and nobody said a word?” Stanley Fischer, President Obama’s nominee to the Fed position, is a dual U.S. and Israel citizen.

If this continues, with the Federal Reserve – and by the way, did you notice how last week, the Federal Reserve approved Stanley Fischer of the governor – deputy governor or deputy chairman – of the Federal Reserve? Who is Stanley Fischer? He was the governor of the Bank of Israel. Hello! How does the governor of the Bank of Israel move over to the United States and become the deputy chairman of the federal reserve, and nobody said a word?

That’s another topic, but if they are allowed to do this kind of stuff, this harassment, using the power of the federal reserve, the FDIC, to cut off the credit of legitmate businesses, Larry, they’re going to extend this to political correctness. For example, they’ll start cutting off the bank accounts of churches that uphold same-sex marriage. They’ll choose their topics: ‘Oh, you’re a global warming denier. We’re going to have to cut off your credit.’

Creation Museum founder Ken Ham found it “ironic” that Bill Nye, who joined Ham in a debate on Creationism earlier this year, attended the White House Science Fair.

Ham wrote on his blog yesterday that evolution didn’t play a role in any of the projects featured in the fair, which he believes proves that teaching Creationism in public schools would not “undermine technology.”

“The students could all be biblical creationists and that wouldn’t change even one aspect of their experiments and ideas,” he said.

On May 27, President Obama hosted the “White House Science Fair.” The White House describes this fair as featuring “extraordinary science projects and experiments from some of America’s most innovative students.”

President Obama introduced various government officials, and then the fifth person he introduced was Bill Nye “the Science Guy” of TV fame. Nye received the loudest applause, and President Obama then commented on that response. I actually thought it was ironic that Bill Nye was present. Let me explain.

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During that debate, Bill Nye made disparaging statements about the state of Kentucky, claiming that if students were not taught evolution in school, it would undermine technology. In fact he’s made many similar statements before and after the debate.

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I have a question about the fair and its experiments: Please tell me what the role of a belief in evolution played in any of these experiments and innovative ideas? The answer is none! Evolution is not mentioned. The students could all be biblical creationists and that wouldn’t change even one aspect of their experiments and ideas. Isn’t it ironic, that Bill Nye, who has stated over and over again that students will not be innovative if they believe in creation, was present for these innovative students to be honored—and evolution had zero to do with their accomplishments!

He went on to invite students to attend a camp organized by the Creation Museum:

It’s not beliefs in evolution that are foundational to technology—it’s the Christian worldview founded in the Creator who created the laws of logic, the laws of nature, and the uniformity of nature!

To help your students love science and be innovative—don’t let them be taught by Bill Nye. Send them instead to the Creation Museum, and sign them up for the STEM camp this summer that is run by biblical creationists.

We have already heard from right-wing leaders about how blockingimmigrationreform is needed to preserve gun rights, but now one anti-gay activist argues that opposition to marriage equality is also linked to gun issues.

Former Pennsylvania lawmaker Sam Rohrer, who now leads the American Pastors Network, held a press conference yesterday demanding that Gov. Tom Corbett appeal a federal court ruling striking down the state’s ban on marriage equality, suggesting that the governor’s refusal to do so may jeopardize gun rights:

“If the federal government comes back and says, ‘We’re going to take away your guns – Second Amendment,’ and eviscerate that, or, ‘We’re going to take away private property rights,’ do you think this legislature or this governor is going to stand up and say, ‘Well, that’s fine, go ahead and do it’? Because if we do, we don’t live in a republic anymore.”

"Let's be clear, this ruling was made by one man - a federal district judge unelected and unaccountable. Politically appointed, never facing the voters and never answering to the press, many people in this position when unrestrained by moral truth, perceive themselves to be above the law," said Rohrer, who held the press conference in the Rotunda of the state Capitol. "Indeed, their arrogance makes them appear as if they think they are God."

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Rohrer accused Jones - who in ruling the former ban on gay marriage as a violation of constitutional rights said the law should be "discarded into the ash heap of history"...because "we are better people than these laws" - of aggressive ideological elitism. The pastor added that Jones seemed to have an "undeveloped or distorted understanding" of the basis for civil law, adding that the judge may have been motivated by an intentional defiance of God.

The Rev. Todd Johnson, pastor at First Immanuel Baptist Church in Philadelphia, said the future welfare of the black community hinged on the protection of traditional marriage.

"Marriage is biblical and sacred honor between one man and one woman," he said. "In the African-American community, the statistics are overwhelming: in traditional families anchored by the marriage of one man and one woman, children are less likely to commit a crime, less likely to have babies out of wedlock, more likely to graduate from school, and more likely to participate in the workforce in a meaningful way."

Johnson said the uptick in negative statistics in the black community has coincided with the dismantling of the nuclear family.

"Governor Corbett's decision shows a lack of traditional moral leadership, and in the end, it will have a tremendously negative impact on the already declining family structure in the urban African-American community," Johnson said.

Yesterday, Iowa conservative activist Bob Vander Plaats once again compared the GOP’s fight against marriage equality to efforts to abolish slavery, proclaiming that Republicans will win their battle against gay rights “just like with slavery.”

The Family Leader president spoke with radio host Steve Deace about Republican politicians who they believe are caving on the issue of same-sex marriage.

Vander Plaats, whose group once claimed that black families were better off under slavery than they are today, said that Republicans should preserve their anti-gay stance: “We actually stand for what God has designed because, just like with slavery, the truth is on our side. We can win this battle.”

North Carolina Religious Right activist Mark Creech has a theory about why “hunger is rampant in India.” It’s not that “they don’t have enough food,” the Christian Action League director writes today in the Christian Post. Instead, he claims, it’s because “false religion has a stranglehold on their hope for a better future.”

“Though I do not mean to disparage that beautiful country, it cannot be denied the two prominent religions, Hinduism and Islam, hold the nation back,” he writes. He argues that the vegetarianism of many Hindus and what he believes is Islam’s teaching that “human initiative amounts to nothing” are perpetuating hunger in India.

“The factor determining wealth is connected more to a people's belief system than anything else,” he concludes. We hope nobody tells him about Qatar.

Few people ever question why Western Civilization has experienced so much abundance in comparison to poorer nations around the world. The reason is inextricably connected to Christianity. The Bible says, "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he" (Prov. 23:7). What individuals believe, what nations believe has everything to do with their essence and determines whether they grow, multiply, and succeed.

I served as a short-term missionary to India on three different occasions and saw this principle worked-out first-hand. India's economy has been stagnated for centuries. Though I do not mean to disparage that beautiful country, it cannot be denied the two prominent religions, Hinduism and Islam, hold the nation back. Hunger is rampant in India, but not because they don't have enough food. Hinduism teaches that people who die come back as animals. There are plenty of cows and pigs that roam the streets freely, but no one will slaughter them, even if their child's belly is bloated with malnutrition. Moreover, two hundred million "sacred cows," eat up enough food to feed seven people, taking enough sustenance that could feed as many as 1.4 billion. Neither will they kill the mice and rats that devour much of the grain. For those who have embraced Islam, the fatalism of that religion stifles human progress by telling them Allah has fated all that there is and human initiative amounts to nothing. False religion has a stranglehold on their hope for a better future.

So the affluence of a people doesn't simply rest with the presence of natural resources as many seem to think. There are plenty of countries that have considerably less natural resources that are more prosperous than those who have more natural resources, but are still not as prosperous. The factor determining wealth is connected more to a people's belief system than anything else.

WASHINGTON – Today the Senate Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing on a proposed constitutional amendment to restore the ability of Congress and the states to regulate the raising and spending of money in elections, an ability that was gutted by Supreme Court decisions like Citizens United v. FEC and McCutcheon v. FEC. This morning People For the American Way and ally organizations delivered more than two million petitions, signed by Americans from every state, in support of such an amendment.

People For the American Way executive vice president Marge Baker released the following statement:

“Today’s hearing shows that some of our elected leaders are really listening to the American people’s call for money in politics reform. More than nine in ten voters think it’s important for elected officials to work to lessen money’s influence on our democratic system. Voters want a democracy where the voices of everyday Americans matter, not just the voices of the super-rich.

“A constitutional amendment is only warranted in rare circumstances, but in the wake of Supreme Court decisions like Citizens United and McCutcheon that have undermined the basic functioning of our democracy, the American people must act to restore it. Today two million Americans have a message, loud and clear, for Congress: we want our democracy back.”

On Monday, People For the American Way released an edit memo on how SJ Res.19 would restore the First Amendment and strengthen our democracy. PFAW also submitted testimony for the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing and joined close to 50 ally organizations in a letter urging senators to support SJ Res. 19.

Executive vice president Marge Baker is available for interviews with the press. To arrange an interview or for additional photos of the petition drop, please contact Layne Amerikaner at media@pfaw.org / 202-467-4999.

A new National Park Service initiative to recognize locations significant in the history of the LGBT rights movement such as the Stonewall Inn has obviously upset Religious Right activists, including Peter LaBarbera of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality.

"We're going to teach our kids and our citizens that homosexuality is a civil rights issue when it's not," he laments. "It's a human misbehavior issue. It's just a sin movement – and we're elevating it to civil rights icon status."

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"I fear for our country, because when a nation starts celebrating sexual immorality as the norm and as a social good, then that nation cannot survive in the long run," he explains. "Every other civilization has been brought down for sexual immorality as part of the factors bringing it down, and I think the United States of America will not be an exception in that regard."

LaBarbera adds the homosexual lobby is so powerful, it can push for something – such as the Park Service policy – and it's a done deal before most Americans even know about it, such as the Harvey Milk commemorative postage stamp.

Speaking on his radio program, “Washington Watch,” Perkins chastised Democratic leaders like Chuck Schumer — who Perkins said “thinks he understands freedom better than America’s Bill of Rights” — and Mark Udall for opposing the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision.

“The National Archives will need more than bombproofing to protect America’s founding documents,” he warned. Perkins then invited Sen. Pat Roberts onto the show to discuss the proposed amendment.

The Kansas Republican thanked Perkins for not only defending Citizens United but also bringing attention to the imprisonment of Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, a Sudanese woman married to an American who is in jail in Sudan for converting to Christianity. Perkins replied that the two cases are actually related: “The two of them are very connected. In our First Amendment we have our freedom of religion and freedom of speech and we keep our freedom of religion by working to keep our freedom of speech, and political speech is actually what’s under attack here.”

Roberts accused Senate Democrats of trying to “restrict the free speech of those who simply disagree with them.”

Later, Roberts said supporters of a constitutional amendment like Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid seek to “regulate free speech so they can silence their critics and retain their hold on power.”

“The press, throughout the annals of modern history, has been used by the enemies of God to change culture and by using cultural change or influencing cultural change, the enemies of God have been able to create a moral collapse in our society and in our political realm,” Swimp said, before railing against “ravaged activist judges.”

But the Indiana Republican, now the state’s governor, is joining a longlineofRepublicans who voted against the stimulus but then took credit for stimulus dollars that went toward projects in their districts.

The Times of Northwest Indiana reports today that Pence, rumored to be considering a presidential run, is now taking credit for projects in his state that were funded by the stimulus bill that he opposed.

Consider the governor's visit to Hammond on Thursday: Pence cheered the start of the Indiana Gateway rail improvements that will help speed freight and passenger rail travel through Northwest Indiana.

"I say let's blow the horn, let's get the Gateway open and be on the way to a more prosperous Indiana," Pence proclaimed at the Hammond-Whiting Amtrak station.

The $71.4 million project will cut delays at region rail crossings by 70 hours a year, shave an hour off Amtrak trips between Chicago and Detroit, and create an estimated 700 jobs, according to Pence's Indiana Department of Transportation.

But the money for the project isn't coming from INDOT.

The Indiana Gateway is being paid for by the federal government through the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, more commonly known as the stimulus.

As a congressman, Pence had a lot to say about the stimulus when it was being debated by the U.S. House. As chairman of the House Republican Conference, he led opposition to the stimulus in the chamber and condemned it repeatedly in national television appearances.

Pence defended his stance by explaining that the previous Republican governor, Mitch Daniels, was a stimulus hypocrite too:

"I do support the state of Indiana's efforts, over the last administration and this administration, to marshal those dollars and put them to work in ways that I think are going to help Northwest Indiana's economy grow and really maintain our posture as the Crossroads of America," Pence said.

Pence also noted he is not the first Hoosier governor to blast stimulus spending on one hand, and grab for stimulus cash with the other.

Former Gov. Mitch Daniels also condemned the stimulus. But the Republican had no qualms about taking some $1 billion in stimulus money that was intended to provide "extra" funds for Indiana schools, and instead using it to replace a regular state payment to school corporations.

That stimulus switcheroo enabled Indiana to maintain its budget reserve though the Great Recession and is the foundation of the $2 billion state bank account that Pence regularly touts as evidence of his sound fiscal management.

Even while railing against the stimulus bill as a congressman, Pence wrote a letter [PDF] requesting stimulus dollars for his district and hosted a job fair with stimulus-backed employers.

On June 3, 2014, the Judiciary Committee of the United States Senate held a hearing on the need to amend the Constitution to overturn the Supreme Court’s decisions in Citizens United v. FEC, and related cases. In particular, the Committee examined Senator Tom Udall’s amendment proposal SJRES 19, which seeks to restore the constitutional authority to regulate the raising and spending of money to influence elections, so that the American people, and not corporations, billionaires and special interests, hold the power in our elections.

This weekend, “Understanding the Times” host Jan Markell spoke with Minnesota conservative activist Marjorie Holsten about Common Core, which Holtsen claims contains sex-ed material so graphic that it actually violates obscenity laws in several states.

The only reason schools would teach sex-ed, Holsten explains, is that educators are playing the long game in trying to increase the number of Democratic voters: “People say to me, why would they teach such awful things to our children? If you go deep down and you connect those dots, you see that when children are desensitized to sexual things, that affects their ability at a later date to bond with a spouse. And so if you have somebody who can’t bond, they’re not going to have a stable marriage. When you have unstable, broken households, how do they vote? Democrat. So this has a very evil underlying intent.”

Markell also warned that lessons about violence towards African Americans and Native Americans in early American history, along with curricula on child labor laws and the environment, smack of “liberal bias.”

Holsten even predicted that teachers will be punished if they do not “teach that Obama’s the messiah.”

Markell: Second graders are probably going to read about Cesar Chavez, as if seven-year-olds know anything about Cesar Chavez; sixth graders are going to read about Industrial Revolution, child labor; you just indicated that global warming is going to be part of the agenda.

Holsten: Oh yeah. When you read these reading lists, they are designed not only to indoctrinate but to also create in children an absolute hatred of reading.

Markell: The liberal bias seems to be what comes out at me and the fact that conservatives and probably Christians are going to be seen as the mortal enemy, dangerous, whatever. I heard someone say that our founding fathers are probably going to be labeled as racists, that early settlers of America were the persecutors of the indigenous people and again conservatives will be probably painted as a dangerous category of people.

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Holsten: One of the insidious things about Common Core is that teachers get their raises and get their tenure based on how the students do on the test, so if a teacher does not teach something that for a Christian teacher would be absolutely repugnant to their values, the children are not going to do well on this test. If the teacher doesn’t teach that Obama’s the messiah, the children aren’t going to answer that question as desired by the Common Core grading system and so the teacher might not be able to retain her grade. So really we need an uprising.

BarbWire contributor Bill Muehlenberg wrote yesterday that the “homosexual juggernaut” is creating a new “fascist” police state which will rival Nazi Germany, Maoist China and the Soviet Union, where “millions of people were rounded up” and “millions were killed.”

“[T]he once free world is well on its way to becoming another police state,” Muehlenberg warned, alleging that activists who don’t fight the “homosexual agenda” will soon “have blood on their hands.”

One of the most frightening and characteristic features of a police state is the terrible occurrence of being woken in the middle of the night by state security forces. Whether it was Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, or Mao’s China, this was an ever-present reality and fear for many millions of ordinary citizens.

No one was safe. At any time the police forces could be at your door, and the next thing you know you are dragged off by the authorities, often never to be seen again. And usually absolutely no crime was committed – it is just that the state saw you as a threat to their existence.

Of course millions of people were rounded up in such totalitarian societies, and millions were killed. Individual dignity, humanity and freedom meant nothing to these ugly statists. Only the good of the Fatherland or the New Man or the utopian state or whatever mattered.

We soon will celebrate the 70th anniversary of D-Day, in which brave lads from the free world sacrificed their lives to put an end to such tyranny and injustice. The horrible reality of Nazi Germany had to be resisted, and countless lives were lost to keep the world free of such evil.

But the almost unthinkable is now happening: the once free world is well on its way to becoming another police state. Even though so many lives were lost and so much blood was shed seven decades ago, it seems that we have not learned the lessons of history.

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The iron fist of the homosexual juggernaut is utterly frightening to behold. The ordinary citizen seems to be quite powerless to resist it in any way. Any faulty (non-PC) thought or speech is quickly and mercilessly pounced upon by the militant homosexual activists and their stooges in the state apparatus.

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That knock on the door in the middle of the night certainly seems to be just around the corner. The militants have so established themselves and their agenda, that no one is safe who dares to take a different point of view.

We are all at risk now. Of course some people will not suffer in the least. Those cowardly and compromised Christians who urge us to just get along with, and accommodate ourselves to, the homosexual agenda, or the creeping sharia agenda, will not be in any trouble.

Their craven appeasement and capitulation will put them in good standing with the activists – at least temporarily. But when these militants really get into power, especially the Islamists, the first ones to lose their heads will be these “useful idiots,” as Lenin referred to them.

Friends, we are in a war. Every day the other side is getting further emboldened to carry out their fascist agendas. And all the while, most Christians are snoozing right through all this. They don’t seem to know and they don’t seem to care. And they have blood on their hands as a result.

Writing in his June newsletter, the Focus on the Family founder calls President Obama the “anti-religious freedom president” and suggests that he is the first president to propose federal funding to Planned Parenthood. In reality, Planned Parenthood has received federal funding since 1970.

You may have read one of the hundreds of blogs and articles that were critical of Shirley and me following the recent National Day of Prayer event in Washington, D.C. Most of the criticism was aimed at me, which I’ll address in a moment. Almost all of the angry editorials were written by liberal activists who were apparently looking for an excuse to damage the prayer event in the nation’s capital. They are hostile to any public display of religious fervor. The writers of these blogs despise conservative Christians, especially those of us who stand firm for what we believe.

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Remember that I reported to you two months ago that the President’s proposed federal budget for the next fiscal year, 2014-2015, included $286,000,000 for Planned Parenthood and other abortion enterprises.vii That has never been done in history. Fortunately, Congress rejected this budget out of hand and refused to pass it.

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That evening, Shirley and I accepted an invitation to appear live on the Fox News television program, The Kelly File, hosted by Megyn Kelly. It took us nearly two hours to get to the studio and wait our turn. When it came, we were given four on-air minutes, all of which was taken with Megyn challenging what I had said that day. Perhaps you saw it. Shirley was treated disrespectfully. Megyn asked her only one question, and before Shirley could say a word, the host said they were out of time.xii Off Kelly went to a commercial and another story.

Dobson ends the newsletter by comparing himself to Abraham Lincoln and the founding fathers, whom he said established the “freedom to worship” as “the first and most foundational of our freedoms.”

Our Founding Fathers referred to such a moment when they answered the call to arms. They knew the task before them would cost them dearly. In the last sentence of the Declaration of Independence, the writers said, “And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”xviii For us, the path you and I must follow is also clear, even if we are threatened by powerful people. If we live, we live, and if we die, we die. We will render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, but in no wise will we render unto Caesar that which belongs to God.xix Every baby, born and unborn, is His and they deserve our love and protection. I’ll say the obvious: what is at stake here is not just the right to pray in public. It is our obligation to defend the Constitution of this great nation that grants Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, Jews, Muslims and Hindus the freedom to worship as they please. Or they can choose not to worship at all. This is the first and most foundational of all our freedoms, and future generations depend on it. All others listed in the Bill of Rights flow from this basic liberty. It is what brought the Pilgrims to this new land, establishing Plymouth Colony in 1620. They were willing to suffer severe hardships in order to live as free men and women. That passion to worship according to our individual consciences has defined us as a nation.

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I will leave you with one more thought. When Congresswoman Hahn protested that a prayer service was an inappropriate place to speak for unborn children and religious liberty, a colleague of mine, Dick Bott, reminded me of a speech given on March 6th, 1860, by Abraham Lincoln. He had been warned not to speak of the contentious issue of slavery. Here is a paragraph from that thoughtful speech:

There is no place where you will even allow it to be even called wrong. We must not call it wrong in the Free States, because it is not there, and we must not call it wrong in the Slave States because it is there; we must not call it wrong in politics because that is bringing morality into politics, and we must not call it wrong in the pulpit because that is bringing politics into religion; we must not bring it into the Tract Society or the other societies, because those are such unsuitable places, and there is no single place, according to you, where this wrong thing can properly be called wrong.

There is a tragic similarity between the horrors of slavery and the murder of infants. Both have deprived human beings of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” What Lincoln said about the first is what I would say about the second. Our countrymen continue to kill more than a million babies every year, and yet there is no appropriate gathering or venue to call it evil. Not in churches, not in Synagogues, not in polite society, not in businesses or corporations, not even in a prayer service where we have come in a solemn assembly to call on the name of God Almighty, to humble ourselves and seek His face, and to turn from our wicked ways. If we, His people, will meet those conditions, He promises to hear our cries from heaven, forgive our sin and heal our land. (2 Chron. 7:14.) Where, other than the National Day of Prayer, is it more appropriate to confess our guilt, and ask the Lord to forgive us? And what better place than the nation’s capital is there to call attention to the efforts of our leaders to strip away our Constitutional rights to worship according to our consciences, and to speak the truth in love? Inappropriate, indeed!

People For the American Way’s Voters Alliance PAC has announced an endorsement of New Jersey Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman’s candidacy for New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District.

Watson Coleman has served in the New Jersey General Assembly for eight consecutive terms, and serves as vice chair of the education committee. She is the first African American woman to have served as majority leader of the state assembly and is the first African American woman to serve as chair of the New Jersey Democratic State Central Committee. She has distinguished herself as a true progressive Democrat, with a wide range of endorsements from advocacy groups, public officials, and prominent supporters. If elected, Watson Coleman would be the first woman of color to represent New Jersey in the United States House of Representatives and the only female in New Jersey’s congressional delegation.

“Bonnie Watson Coleman is the type of person who stands up for fundamental rights and freedoms,” said PFAW Political Director Randy Borntrager. “She is a fighter for voting rights, women’s rights, fairness, and equality for all Americans. In Congress, she’ll be a truly progressive leader that New Jersey can count on.”

Watson Coleman has distinguished herself among her primary competitors in her willingness to speak out against a wide range of Gov. Christie’s harmful policies, and against the GOP-led Congress’s assault on working families, education, and LGBT rights. She is a native of Camden, NJ, and is a long time resident of Ewing. She is married to husband William, and they have three sons. Her campaign website is http://www.bonnieforcongress.com.